Formless Ascension: My Affinity Is Limitless

Uhtred exploded off his feet the instant he felt the Ancestor’s spell take effect around him, his eyes widening in alarm.

It was too late.

In a five-meter radius around him, the air pressure dropped to zero instantly. Every trace of air within that small dome vanished, sucked out by the Ancestor’s spell.

The white-hot inferno wreathing Uhtred’s body was extinguished immediately, stripped of the air it needed to burn... but losing his flames was the least of his problems.

The sudden vacuum created a void on the ground, and the only matter left inside — his body — began expanding to fill the space.

His eyes bulged as the fluids behind them tried to force their way out. His skin bloated in an instant, and his essence core began to expand from the surge of fire essence still burning inside him with nowhere to vent.

Pain like he had never felt before flooded Uhtred’s senses. It took everything in his power to force his body to remain intact, while at the same time forcing the chaotic surge of fire essence back under control.

He could barely think through the agonizing pain, but somewhere in the back of his mind, a part of him regretted taking on an opponent so vastly higher-leveled than himself...

Yet at the same time, the primal part of himself, the one that guided his current violent state of mind, burned with rage and a desire to push past the pain.

Thankfully, the life-threatening spell ceased. The effect of the vacuum vanished, but it was not the end of the Ancestor’s technique.

As air rushed back into that small vacuum of space, it created an implosion that bombarded him from every angle like cannons.

The sound was deafening, the force terrifying. It rocked Uhtred internally, causing his brain to vibrate. For several seconds, he didn’t even know where he was or what he was doing.

Slowly, he began to come back to himself, blood pouring from his orifices in streams. It bled from his eyes, his nostrils, and the corners of his mouth.

He staggered on his feet like a drunk man, yet his focus remained locked on his essence core, preventing the Inferno Violence spell from going haywire and imploding him from the inside.

In an instant, the fire essence trapped inside his body ignited once more. It burst forward in an explosion that rocked the surroundings, turning the earth into a pool of lava.

”Haha! Hahaha!!” Uhtred cackled, his bloodshot eyes rising to meet the Ancestor’s battered form.

”You crazy old man!” he choked out through gurgling blood. ”What kind of crazy spell was that?!”

Contrary to what one would think, the Ancestor looked even worse off, as if he had been the one to bear the brunt of Hollow Vacuum’s might instead of Uhtred.

Casting such a spell had drained him severely. Hollow Vacuum was the kind of technique used to finish an opponent with certainty, a trump card that weaponized the world’s atmosphere against an enemy.

”H—How are you still alive...?” the Ancestor panted weakly, staring at Uhtred in shock.

His arms hung limply at his sides, charred black from blocking the explosive burst of flames that followed Uhtred tanking the vacuum.

By all logic, Uhtred should have been dead, yet he was still standing.

”This is the feeling!!” Uhtred roared between heavy coughing fits, looking no better than the Ancestor.

He had been brought right to the edge of death in a way he hadn’t experienced in a long time.

His insides felt like mush. The final impact of the air collapsing inward had squeezed him from all sides like crumpled paper.

He was standing on his two feet as though Hollow Vacuum had done no significant harm to him, but that couldn’t have been further from the truth. Uhtred could barely hear anything the Ancestor was saying.

He was running on pure madness and instinct while his Inferno Violence continued to burn.

> Agile_Battlestar Grandmaster: Hey! Hey! How is this guy still alive?!! Someone at his level should have died from that Hollow Vacuum spell!!

> SchemingDemon_696: @Agile_Battlestar Grandmaster I’m more shocked that he was able to pull off an Elemental Manifestation at his level at all!! Am I going crazy, or can someone explain how that is possible?! This guy’s just a Nascent Realm ascender! Are you telling me he can already manipulate his sub-core formation?!

> Kryton Overlord_01: @SchemingDemon_696 There have been rare records of prodigies achieving similar feats in the history of the Multiverse... But yeah, it is still unbelievable. He doesn’t even seem to realize he’s pulling off a technique normally restricted to the Awakened Realm...

> TheStarTravelingDaoist: @Kryton Overlord_01 Apparently, this isn’t the first time he’s broken the limits of his realm! @Anuran All-Mother of Fertility said he created sub-cores back when he was still in the Mortal Realm!

> Serial_Troll_Nyx: You guys and your exaggerated hype! So he has some talent, so what?! The kid barely escaped that Hollow Vacuum spell with his life! Look at him now, he’s lost his mind to the manifestation! He’s being driven by pure instinct! Once his core recoils from over-exertion, this whole talent facade will come crashing down!!

...

Just like usual, Uhtred’s chat was firing off messages. Multiversal viewers were asking different questions.

Some wanted to know how he survived the Ancestor’s grand attack. Others were focused on the fact that he had created an elemental manifestation at the Nascent Realm.

Just as they said, Uhtred didn’t realize it, but tweaking his sub-core formation to create Inferno Violence wasn’t something anyone at the Nascent Realm could normally do.

However, from the current state of things, the manifestation was taking a serious toll on him.

That, coupled with the damage he had taken from Hollow Vacuum, had caused him to lose control entirely.

Over the next few minutes, Uhtred launched himself at the Ancestor repeatedly, but the old man, despite his exhaustion, managed to dodge his lunges.

The Ancestor realized Uhtred’s movements were no longer sharp or calculated. The boy was attacking on pure instinct, and the old man chose to stay on the defensive, waiting for him to run himself dry.

Even so, dodging Inferno Violence was not easy, especially in the Ancestor’s weakened state. He suffered severe thermal burns each time Uhtred closed the distance, their violent exchange carving a path of destruction across several miles of forest.

Finally, after nearly ten minutes of full-on rampage, Uhtred collapsed. He dropped to his knees, clutching the center of his chest where his core lay.

Immense pain shot through his body, piercing through the fog of madness in his mind.

Instinctively, he began forcing his fire sub-core to separate from his main core.

The violent element burned within him, beginning to cause severe internal damage by the second.

It was as though the fire element was trying to take root permanently inside his main core, but Uhtred refused to allow it.

His consciousness snapped back fully, and without taking in his surroundings, he immediately began forcing the sub-core out.

It resisted his pull like magnets refusing to come apart.

Guttural screams tore through Uhtred’s throat. He writhed on the ground as his skin began to crackle from the immense heat.

The normal protection he had against his own spell was coming apart as his fire sub-core tried to force a permanent transformation.

The battle for control continued for more than a minute while Uhtred screamed on the ground. His surroundings turned into a hell of flames as Inferno Violence continued to burn brighter.

The Ancestor watched from a distance with numb horror in his eyes. He had thought he could capture Uhtred in his weakened state, but the situation had become far more dangerous.

In the distance, An Clan warriors and elders began pouring out of what remained of the burning forest.

The long trail of battle had left a path of utter destruction that burned intensely, sending thick plumes of smoke into the sky.

Nayu An was among the clan members to arrive. They rushed to their Ancestor, their eyes filled with terror as they took in his battered state.

Just who had turned their regal Ancestor into this miserable figure? The old man looked hollow and exhausted, his hands charred black and his clothes reduced to ash.

The elders quickly rushed to drape a cloak over him, trying to protect his dignity in the eyes of the many warriors present...

But their attention wasn’t even on the Ancestor.

Nearly all eyes were on Uhtred. His screams had begun to mellow, his body trembling as the flames on his skin surged in cycles.

He was beginning to gain control of his core again, causing the intensity of Inferno Violence to fluctuate on the outside.

The burning manifestation surged and mellowed repeatedly until, slowly, the cycles began to lessen. Then finally, it stopped altogether.

Uhtred crouched in a literal pool of lava, floating on the only piece of scorched earth left, heat billowing around him with scalding intensity.

Yet that heat did not burn him. There were no longer any flames on his body, and he seemed unharmed despite his fully naked state.

The An Clan elders looked on with curiosity, debating whether to take the risk and try to claim Uhtred’s body in his weakened state before he made a move.

However, the Ancestor’s voice stopped them in their tracks.

”Don’t go near him...” the old man croaked. ”...if you do... you’ll die.”

He had barely sounded his warning when a frigid wave of frost spread outward in an instant.

All An Clan warriors and elders went on alert immediately, preparing their spells for an attack.

Uhtred stood up slowly, his eyes closed. Around him, a pulse of frost cycled, followed immediately by a pulse of heat. His brows were furrowed, his focus locked entirely on what was happening inside of him.

To the multiversal viewers watching, it was shocking that he had controlled the fire manifestation and brought it to a halt. Internally, however, Uhtred was not finished yet.

Instead of battling his fire sub-core alone, he brought in its direct opposite: he pulled his water and frost core into the mix.

The two opposing elements balanced each other, cycling within his main core, slowly at first, then gaining speed as he urged them faster.

He forced their orbits to become unstable, and the two cores naturally began to spiral out of his main core of their own accord.

In that moment, Uhtred reached an enlightenment.

Just like during his months of preparation back on Earth, he realized he had been restricting his own understanding of his class. He had always viewed his Formless nature as a simple ability to cast any element he wanted, but it was far beyond that limited understanding.

With a thought, he pulled in his earth sub-core and his air sub-core, drawing them into the spiraling mix.

On the outside, the An Clan watched, mesmerized and flabbergasted.

Uhtred’s body turned into a literal manifestation of air, then fluidly into a manifestation of water, then of flames, and then of earth, cycling through several at once.

He was playing with the elements fluidly, formlessly...

He let out a light sigh and opened his eyes softly.

”I understand it now...”

Suddenly, just as he was reveling in his enlightenment and the new manifestation of his power, a blood-red prompt materialized in his vision.

[Manual Scenario Override Protocol Activated]

[The Tower Master has intervened in your scenario]

[100% of your audience have voted to trigger an emergency intervention]

[Your scenario has been temporarily halted. You are currently being transported to a Tower Interview]